


Si Vales, Valeo

by Anonymous



Category: Horus Heresy - Various Authors
Genre: Alternate Universe - Roboutian Heresy, Betrayal, Body Horror, M/M, Politics, Sibling Incest
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-12-31
Updated: 2020-12-31
Packaged: 2021-03-11 02:08:59
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,161
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28457337
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/
Summary: I am strong when you are strong.Or wherein Roboute is bemused (even though he shouldn't be) to discover Ferrus has had the workings of statesmanship in him all along.
Relationships: Roboute Guilliman/Ferrus Manus
Kudos: 5
Collections: PB Anon Meme - 2020





	Si Vales, Valeo

**Author's Note:**

> Proof positive there will always be porn, this fic is set in Zahariel's _Roboutian Heresy_ , where it is Guilliman rather than Horus who instigates the rebellion against the Emperor of Mankind.

The device which the Iron Tenth had wrested from the grasp of Mortarion's men was a curious object. It managed to stand out, even amongst Ferrus' forge which was a veritable congery of curiousities in its own right.

Ferrus had followed his eye and gave a sidelong shrug.

'You may have it,' he said.

And so Roboute Guilliman came into possession of the Tuchulcha Device.

\---

Roboute stood before the device's servitor, an emaciated youth that looked about the same age as the boys of Macragge who were to be inducted into the Legion. One would have to search far, perhaps in the backwater worlds of Ultramar, to find future warriors of the Thirteenth who could look so gaunt. And even then, Roboute suspected the stench of death and decay would not linger about like an overripe fruit.

"Hello Roboute," Tuchulcha greeted. It made to perform a curtsey; an absurdity considering both the sex of its current form and said form's state of dress. "I have good news today."

"Hello Tuchulcha," Roboute replied. He seated himself across from the slave-servitor before pulling out a data-slate. The wretched thing had given him false hope twice previously. In the event of another false positive, he had sworn to shuttle it off to the Ghoul Stars.

"What?" the slave crossed the boy's arms while the machine gave a whine of protest in the background. "You doubt me still?"

"You have given me no reason to think otherwise."

A chuckle between a delphid and a ossuarix was the device's response.

"You will see," Tuchulcha said. "I have found him at last." And with that, it lifted its arms and the machine's internal circuitry lit up, transporting itself and the Primarch into the shadowy depths of the Warp. Roboute was unimpressed; these were the same trappings as the previous two times. The device was mercifully silent for these episodes. Perhaps the act of transporting him across time and space taxed it. Perhaps it wanted to see his unfettered reaction.

He was brought out of the Warp and into real space, specifically into the alcoves of an Eldar court. What he saw before him was enough to take his breath away.

As per his request, Tuchulcha was now showing him the fate of the Phoenician. At the end, Ferrus hadn't the heart to truly slay his best-beloved brother, and so Roboute was tormented with the disquieting certainty that he would someday return and claim his former place in the Gorgon's heart. Roboute hated that there was no certainty without death.

The scene before him then, was life unto death. Or rather, a scene where death would be clearly preferable to life. The Phoenician was present, awake and alive, though in no part whole, and though he had been robbed of his limbs and sight the Eldar still forced him into their duelling cages. He was now armed with chitonous limbs that were knives unto themselves. The pommel of a familiar blade had been wedged into his mouth. He had become a wholly abhorrent sight, more xenos than man, and Roboute recoiled despite himself.

Fulgrim whirled at once, fixing his hollowed-out sockets into the space where Roboute hovered over. He couldn't see him. He couldn't see anything. And yet...

As with the previous two times, the simulation (if it could be called that) ended abruptly. Roboute drew a sharp breath and found himself back on Macragge, seated before Tuchulcha.

"Welcome back," the servitor grinned, clapping spread-open palms with mock enthusiasm. "Did it please you?"

Roboute was momentarily unnerved to discover the sight had pleased him. He had always been Fulgrim's inferior where aesthetics were concerned. He had in fact even contented himself in the falsehood that this prior superiority was what had endeared Ferrus to him in the first place. It was not so, he knew that now, but he knew just as well that the Fulgrim who had been debased so could never, for any reason, forgive the Gorgon.

The knowledge brought forth a tremor of delight.

"Yes," he answered, reaching out to carefully stroke the corpse's matted hair. "It pleased me greatly. Thank you for directing my attention to it."

"May I ask a boon of you then, Roboute?" the device countered, reaching up to touch his hand. As expected, the corpse was cold yet clammy from the midsummer currents that drifted through the halls.

In what went against a lifetime of conditioning, Roboute made no move to extract his hand.

"You may," he said, after a suitably pregnant pause.

"I may? I may?" the child's hand moved back down to clap with even greater enthusiasm. "Oh happy day! The gods are smiling upon me!" The device maneuvered the boy to fall on his knees. The pair of bones hit the floor with a telling clatter.

"Oh Lord Roboute, I beg you to grant me an audience with the Emperor."

Roboute frowned. "He is light-years away and likely dead at that."

"No," Tuchulcha said, though it still spoke into the floor, "I do not mean your father, Roboute."

It was speaking of Ferrus, Roboute realised.

"You have already met with him."

"He did not acknowledge me. He does not like unclean things." Another high-pitched giggle that seemed to travel from the floor to Roboute's throne. "He is unlike you, Roboute."

 _Unclean things_. The phrase made Roboute's stomach turn. It was what Horus and Lorgar had referred to Ultramar as. Both of them were blindsided fools. For what good was practice that needed to be changed with each new conflict, with each new warzone? The March to Terra would prove not only the worth of his methodology, but his own right to the title of 'Warmaster'.

"Roboute?" Tuchulcha asked. It had since moved the corpse back to an upright position. "Do you consent?"

"I cannot. Not without my brother's consent. I will ask him on your behalf." The words sounded absurd even to his ears. He was a Primarch, the Lord Protectorate of Ultramar, and the one who would seize the Throneworld from the warmongerers who had since lay claim to it. He was no serf, no piddling equerry!

"But Roboute," Tuchulcha protested, and the boy's vocal chords squeaked in protest as the device forced them to contract in sing-song, "Are you not your brother's keeper?"

Roboute gave a properly derisive snort at that.

"In this universe," he murmured, shaking his head ruefully, "There are some things that will not come to pass, no matter how much we wish them to be so."

Tuchulcha gave another eerie chuckle.

"Dear Roboute," it said, "If that is the case, it is only because you do not wish for it enough."

\---

Roboute was bemused, though he should not have been, to discover that Ferrus was every inch the consummate statesman with a knack for oratory that might easily rival the Phoenician or the Warmaster. He didn't put it to use often (or indeed, to Roboute's perfect memory, ever), but had no difficulty extracting it from his trove of talents with but a puff of dust.

It helped, of course, that he was a son of the Emperor of Mankind. That he had been crafted to a higher position. Yet at the same time, they had between them eighteen other brothers and Roboute could not think of anyone else who might inspire such goodwill and devotion in so short a time amongst the men and women of Ultramar.

If the proof were not right before him, he would not have believed it, but there was the Gorgon himself, dressed in Imperial robes, flanked by Gabriel Santar on the right and Marius Gage on the left. It was impressive enough that both captains might stand at attention so, outwardly unaffected by their recent knowledge of their lord. Roboute did not know if he would be capable of the same.

Lord and lady and soldier and serf presented their cases to the newly-coronated Emperor. He listened to them with diffident grace, rarely speaking directly to the petitioning parties and handing his judgements down instead by means of either First Captain. This was a boon as, despite the previously noted goodwill and devotion the citizens expressed, it was nonetheless daunting to be in the presence of a demigod. Not one of them could hold his gaze, much less speak coherently while doing so.

\---

"It is unlike you," Ferrus started, after the crowds had gone and even Gabriel and Marius had been dismissed from his side, "To skulk about in the shadows."

"Are you not tired?" Roboute asked, genuinely curious but at the same time, countering with a question of his own.

"No," Ferrus shook his head and the light of the chandeliers on the balustrades glinted off his myriad adornments. "I have already formulated a system of command. Gabriel and Marius will be implementing it over the next week. I foresee a ninety percent reduction in direct petitions as a consequence."

"My brother," Roboute chided, "You forget there is value still in meeting face to face."

"And you, Roboute," Ferrus replied, even as he drew near so as to his palm to the back of Roboute's neck, "Forget that we are in the middle of a war. Provisions need to be made, in the event Throneworld does not fall within your calculations."

Roboute shivered and stole a kiss, leaning away and then into his brother's touch.

"That is your talent, I suppose," he murmured, even as his hands were undoing the many clasps that ran down the sides of Ferrus' robes. "Seeing things as they are."

Ferrus kissed him back and Roboute delighted in the Gorgon's famed hands slipping beneath his own inner tunic.

"In that case," Ferrus answered between kisses, "Father has gifted you with seeing the world as it should be." He pinched Roboute's right nipple, eliciting a guttural moan, before pulling hard. "I am not ashamed of what I see. You should be the same."

"Never," Roboute reassured him, even as his hands ran up and then down Ferrus' thighs. He kissed Ferrus again only to whisper against his mouth: "I would have you again."

Ferrus deepened the kiss, lazily twining their tongues, and Roboute moaned again at the intimacy of the gesture.

"Here?" Ferrus answered, gesturing at the audience chamber. "Again?"

Here. Yes. Always.

Instead of answering, Roboute surged forward, capturing his brother's mouth in another kiss, this one even more passionate than the ones before. No further words were exchanged between them as he slaked his passions upon the Gorgon, spending yet again between his thighs. Once, twice, thrice... he was light-headed and suitably content by the fourth time, and Ferrus too, seemed to be aglow with pleasure.

Which was why the slant into affairs of state was all the more sudden. Roboute was still buried to the hilt when Ferrus turned and tweaked his ear.

"Brother," he said, taking on a reproachful tone, "You've never had the mind for dissembling. Now is not the time to start, when we are on the cusp of a war that will rend the galaxy itself." And then he clenched once, perhaps as a warning, but it only served to stir Roboute a fifth time.

"You're right," Roboute confessed, when he had spent in Ferrus again. The two of them were lounging on the throne with Ferrus half in and half out of his lap. "I used that device you gifted me to look for your best-beloved brother."

As expected, Ferrus stiffened at the mention of Fulgrim. It was not any sign of arousal, that much was certain.

The Gorgon lowered his hand, moving it to trace the wells Roboute's nails had made in the armrests of the throne. As expected, only a fellow Primarch's fingers could cover all the indentations.

"And?" he said at last. "Did you find him?"

"Yes." It was oddly freeing, to be able to speak freely and frankly with one other soul in the universe.

"He lives?"

"Yes."

Ferrus' lips curled into an especially brutal smile. "Good," he said. "Those sooth-sayers are good swordsmen, despite their penchant for prophecies." He traced the damage Roboute had wrought on the throne before digging his own silver hands in. The handrest melted like noontime butter.

"Fulgrim will come for my head," Ferrus declared, "And I will let him have it. Such is his right."

"You are Emperor now," Roboute cautioned, kissing the Gorgon's bare shoulder. "Your fall would shake the new order."

Ferrus laughed. That too was a harsh sound. Then he turned his head and tugged on Roboute's head, kissing him with more fire than ice.

"Then I will not fall," he promised. "Not with you by my side."

The declaration should not have seized Roboute's heartstrings so, but it did and he allowed himself to be pulled into and subsequently swallowed up by the Gorgon's embrace.

(For was it not, a sing-song voice like Tuchulcha's reminded him in the back of his mind, what he had wanted all along?)


End file.
